Have you ever felt happy when you’re reaching into your wallet and pulling out your credit card? I call this celebratory spending. It’s hard to hate celebratory spending because so many of these achievements ARE worth celebrating.
Your birthday.
Reaching a goal.
Graduating.
Your first client.
Your first 10K.
Whatever you feel is worth celebrating, it is.
Personally, I LOVE celebratory spending. I like rewarding myself (actually, I LOVE rewarding myself) when I reach my goals. I’m proud of my achievements, and I want to celebrate them, especially those I’ve worked SO hard to accomplish.
I’m not here to tell you to stop celebrating yourself. I’m not even going to tell you to stop your celebratory spending. But, I will encourage you to stop and think about what you’re spending and be mindful of how much you’re spending.
How?
One way to do this is to give yourself a budget and stick to the budget. Then, once you hit your goal, celebrate. For example, I really wanted a Michael Kors bag, so I told myself once I hit my income goal, I would give myself a bonus that covered the cost of the bag. The bonus I paid myself fit within my business budget and allowed me to stay within my personal budget. This allowed me to celebrate reaching my goal and stay within both of my budgets, and it still brought me happiness.
Celebratory spending brings us happiness. It feels good to celebrate ourselves and our achievements, as long as it doesn’t bring us stress later on (like when we haven’t budgeted for it and now we can’t pay our bills).
You’ve worked hard for it, and you deserve to be celebrated. Just remember to be mindful about your celebratory spending and set reasonable goals and rewards. Stick to this, and you too can have sassy and sexy numbers.
